Mike Zielinski, also known as Zeke, offers his entertaining and insightful take on politics, sports and topical events. Zeke has been a prolific and creative sports columnist, news columnist, blogger and wordsmith with a lifelong love affair with prose.

Monthly Archives: February 2017

Throw in a surprise ending with a comedic twist and you have movie magic.

The Academy Awards inadvertently followed that script Sunday night.

In the most shocking mix-up in Oscars history, Moonlight won Best Picture — but only after presenter Faye Dunaway announced La La Land as the winner, setting off mass confusion inside the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

After the Oscars, PricewaterhouseCoopers — which tabulates the Oscar votes — released a statement apologizing for the flub: “We sincerely apologize to Moonlight, La La Land, Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, and Oscar viewers for the error that was made during the award announcement for Best Picture. The presenters had mistakenly been given the wrong category envelope and when discovered, was immediately corrected. We are currently investigating how this could have happened, and deeply regret that this occurred. We appreciate the grace with which the nominees, the Academy, ABC, and Jimmy Kimmel handled the situation.”

No word yet on whether President Trump plans to deport the responsible PricewaterhouseCoopers accountants.

Some folks, and they know who they are, think Donald Trump speaks with a forked tongue even though he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth.

But The Prez actually speaks the truth at times.

Imagine that.

At Thursday’s raucous presser, Trump responded to a volley of questions about his ties to Russia by saying: “I can tell you, speaking for myself, I own nothing in Russia. I have no loans in Russia. I don’t have any deals in Russia.”

That’s true.

But it’s not for a lack of trying. Trump has a long history of trying to do business in Russia, but despite many efforts and plenty of boasting and angling, he hasn’t managed to land a single major real estate deal there.

But he has partnered with Russian financiers on major projects elsewhere around the world. Russian investors have been instrumental in helping him cope with all the credit problems he has thanks to his serial bankruptcies. And a number of Trump’s former and current advisers have had financial ties to Russia.

So the question of our time is this: Does Trump’s public affection for Vladimir Putin correspond with his dependence on Russian investors?

The magnificence of Tom Brady, the Greatest of All Time, in leading an astonishingly surreal comeback from 25 points down in the third period to an absolutely stunning 34-28 overtime win over the shell-shocked Atlanta Falcons should be preserved in watercolor for future generations to savor and perhaps even genuflect.

The Patriots were dead. The coroner was about to put toe tags on their corpses.

Their offense was going nowhere. Their defense was a sieve.

Brady took more hard hits than a busy parking lot speed bump.

They should have been drenched with despair.

But no.

They didn’t quit. Not one ounce.

Out of stillness comes swiftness.

Out of patience comes energy.

With Brady’s unstoppable, supernova rhythm of poised perfection, pristine accuracy and riverboat-gambler nerve incredibly steering the wheel in a game that defied adjectives, the Patriots found the gates out of hell.

Terrific Tom is the ultimate lifeline.

As it unfolded before eyes that couldn’t believe what they were seeing, the magic floating in the air was palatable.

The whole world witnessed a colossal miracle.

A resurrection that will be etched in eternity.

It was one of those galactic explosions of white light that simply consumes everything else.

Genius fascinates and watching Brady Sunday night in Houston must have been what it was like to watch Vincent van Gogh paint or Wolfgang Mozart compose.

Roger that, Goodell, and all your Deflategate nonsense.

Brady doesn’t have deflated balls. Just the opposite.

A hard blue vein runs through his character

Brady led the Patriots back from deficits of 21-0 and 28-3 with a throw-early, throw-late approach as the Patriots roared back. Entering Sunday, no team had won the Super Bowl after trailing by more than 10 points.

Brady was named the game’s MVP. It was the fourth time — an NFL record — he had earned MVP honors, having won the award in 2001, 2003 and 2014.

It was the fifth Super Bowl win of Brady’s career, the most for a quarterback. He is the first to play in seven Super Bowls and the victory ties him with defensive end Charles Haley for most Super Bowl rings.

Brady, ancient for a quarterback, finished 43-for-62, the most attempts in Super Bowl history, for 466 yards and two touchdowns. His 466 yards passing are also a Super Bowl record, surpassing the 414 yards Kurt Warner had 17 years ago.